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Beefsteak, a Vegetable-Based Quick-Serve Chain In Several Area Locations


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Has anyone eaten at Beefsteak yet?  Heading to a show at GW tonight with the teen, will probably take him to Burger Tap Shake (since District Commons is booked), but curious about Beefsteak. Though expect it would be much more to my liking than his (he likes Andres places but is more meat-centric than me and only likes some vegetables).

(Edit - really a Foggy Bottom question rather than precisely KC area, but since the whole discussion above was about Foggy Bottom places, it seemed to fit here. Plus I'm taking the above recommendation of BTS.)

Sorry I didn't see this earlier, but the teen woudl probably prefer BTS. I loved Beefsteak. It's kind of like Sweetgreen, where you make your own salad, but with veggies instead.

The veggies you select are dropped from a basket into a water bath that cooks them perfectly. (like a fryer basket.) I like my veggies with a bit of crunch and this was just perfect. One can either order a pre-set menu combination, or just select as many veggies as one would like. Rice, quinoa or bulgur are added, and then you add your choice of toppings. Too many for me to remember to list here. There are upcharges for premium and proteins, such as avocado, poached egg, roast chicken and salt cured salmon. And then you select your "sauce" to top it all off.

With all my allergies I was in hog heaven, and selected any and every veggie I'm not allergic to...and then topped it with lemon juice, avocado, roast chicken AND poached egg. Needless to say I won't be repeating that expensive combo again soon, but will order maybe one premium topping at a time. Total damage was over $16. If I had not added all the premiums, it would have been in line with the cost of a salad combo from Sweetgreen. It was lalso arge enough that I should have eaten half and saved the rest for later. (But didn't) :rolleyes:

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I highly recommend checking out Beefsteak.  As everyone probably already knows, it is in the "fast casual" category (think Chipotle or Shophouse) where you move along the line watching your thing come together and make choices as necessary.  I had one of the "suggested" bowls, kimchi and rice and vegetables and fried onions and whatnot - 8 dollars and really delicious.  If you branch out into "choose your own," the possibilities are endless.  As noted above, your vegetables are nicely and precisely cooked to order in a cool fryerbasket-in-water contraption.  They will sell you a beer or wine if you want.  Clean place, fast and friendly, and it looks like they are trying to keep trash waste to a minimum, which is cool too.

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a coworker and i just went to beefsteak for lunch, and unfortunately i'm not as enthusiastic as sheldman.  it's a very confusing concept, with so many vegetables, sauces, etc. in the selection and no clear idea how they would all fit together even as we were staring at the mise en place.

i went with one of their set options (the eden) because i had no idea how to approach all the options and figured that i might as well experience it through one of the vetted combinations.  roasted garlic yogurt and cilantro sauces were poured on a bed of quinoa.  snowpeas, edamame, green beans, asparagus, and broccoli were flash-boiled (in the fryer contrapion that sheldman mentioned) and piled on top, then dressed with lemon honey dressing (which had no discernable flavor to me) but not otherwise seasoned.  cold toppings (a small pile of what-is-this-doing-here shredded romaine, a few spoonfuls of diced cucumber salad, a tiny bunch of sprouts, and a sprinkling of scallions) were segregated off to one side of the container, and then the entire dish gets a dusting of sesame seeds.  the first bites of the vegetable layer were disappointingly plain, until i stirred it all together to incorporate the delicious sauced quinoa on the bottom.  (my friend commented correctly that everything should get tossed together at the end like at a salad place.)  the result was enjoyable -- and very filling -- but i never forgot that i was virtuously Eating My Vegetables, which i am able to forget with a good sweetgreen salad.  if i had been home and had a ton of vegetable odds-and-ends that i was trying to use up, i would have been very pleased with myself for producing this lunch.  but as a restaurant concept, it's not something that i can imagine craving or rushing back to eat again.  if you're looking for a healthy lunch that isn't sweetgreen across the street, beefsteak is worth trying, but on balance i'd rather just have another rad thai.  (if i do go again, i'd definitely opt for something with more aggressive flavors, like the kimchi one that sheldman enoyed.)    

a couple of tips: (1) if you construct your own, get more than one sauce, as the vast majority of the flavor is coming from that.  my friend only went with one and was quite underwhelmed, while my sauce-soaked quinoa was my favorite part.  (2) consider asking for a sprinkling of sea salt if you generally like your vegetables well seasoned, especially if you go with one of the set options.  it's an option next to the "crunchy" toppings that my friend wisely requested, but my container was lidded and passed to the cashier before i thought to do the same.

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We hit the Dupont location for a to-go lunch on Saturday afternoon.  It was just too nice out and Dupont Circle was hopping and just a block away.

I was not overly impressed with the Kimchi Wa (Rice, Corn, Carrot, Cabbage, Edamame, Bok Choy, Roasted Garlic Yogurt Sauce, and Topped with Scallions, Toasted Sesame Seeds, Corn Nuts, Kimchi and Soy Ginger Dressing).  There's a lot going on here, but once everything is mixed together it ends up being rather monotonous, bite after bite tasting like the soy ginger dressing.  The dish really need more kimchi, I mean it is called Kimchi Wa after all, and the kimchi would cut through the monotony.

More successful was the BEETsteak Sandwich (Marinated Beet, Pickled Red Onions, Sprouts Chipotle "˜Just Mayo'®, Olive Oil and Sea Salt, on an Olive Oil Brioche Bun served with a side of chips.)  It's actually a good sandwich and I'd probably go with that next time.  The Jose Andres branded potato chips are fine.  The beet apple juice was forgettable.

Lunch for two was about $20.  

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I babysat my nephew the other evening up in Tenleytown and we needed to be out of the house for a bit so that my brother and his wife could paint.  I was going to do my normal routine of Cava Grill and Janney playground, but wanted to try Beefsteak.  I got the Eden bowl with salmon added on and a drink which was $18.  I thought the overall price-tag was a little steep.  The dish was very good, I liked the quinoa and yogurt combination and that gave some interesting texture to all the veggies.  It was a really large serving of veggies, which is I assume to make up for the lack of protein in most dishes.  The salmon was good and it really did add to the dish.  I talked with other people at the playground and a lot had just tried it, and there were some complaints that the veggies were really bland.  Luckily in my dish the quinoa, yogurt and sauce really made everything tasty.  But I probably would go back to Cava over Beefsteak.

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I've been three times to the Tenleytown location in the last month and overall I like it. It is a great place to go for a large amount of fresh veggies in a filling meal that is not simply a salad.  You do have to explore a bit on the menu to see what you like. I'd recommend ordering one of the menu items and adding/subtracting rather than jumping in on making your own because it is really the combination of flavors and textures that makes its taste good and different than a salad. So far I've had a the Eden, which I liked but I skipped on the quinoa and other grain options which was a mistake. The Kimchi-waa with added soft egg was really good - especially jazzed up with some Siracha and Jang sauce. Last time I got the Gazpacho bowl which is half way between a soup and a salad. I liked the gazpacho soup, but don't think I'd get it again because it was too much soup and ended up as a very wet salad by the end. I also had a bite of the Frida Kalo which was tasty - but bear in mind the black beans are really a pureed black bean sauce and they give you a bit too much of it in proportion to the other ingredients IMHO.  The best part of Beefsteak is that you can add/subtract as many of the non-protein components you like at no additional charge - I love onions and a bit of crunch so I've added a small scoop of fried onions to the dishes to help make them pop for me.

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